This is a work of Erotic Fantasy. As such, it is not real and does not depict real events or any real person. All characters, businesses, institutions, places, publications, and events in this story are either fictional or are used fictitiously as you might expect in a story where slavery is legally enforced throughout the modern United States. All characters are adults.
I had intended to cover the whole five months between their training at the Sharks and the departure to mars in this chapter, but it simple wasn't possible, so they'll be another chapter before the journey finally gets going.
"The Cost of My Dreams"
Chapter 04 - Identity
By LoyalHound
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I knelt on a slave pad in the warehouse, waiting to have my collar changed. Erin and Denise were lined up with me and each of us was shackled by our left ankle to eye bolts next to the pads. Master Peterson and Mistress Springfield, who represented the Martian Exploration and Colony Company, had our new collars, which seemed quite high end, but we were not told what features they supported, nor why we weren't being fitted with transit tags. The ideal curiosity of slaves was not being indulged by our masters.
They did me first. Master Crenshaw ordered "Collar," and I lifted my hair out of the way with my left hand and kept my right hand on my thigh. He unlocked my collar and removed it and, just for a second, I felt free. Then Master Peterson placed the new collar around my neck and snapped it closed, locking it in place. He calibrated the collar and then signed off on some paperwork for me. Then they did Erin and Denise.
Erin, Denise, and I would be doing the first leg of our trip in a transport van. Angela had been held back a week, and Cheryl and Susan were being sent south via the regional transportation market formally known as The East Coast Slave Transport Market LLC or more informally as the East Coast Local.
Since the Sharks was an end node of the East Coast Local, they would prepare Cheryl and Susan for shipment. Each woman would be fed and watered and made to brush her teeth. Both would be given a large enema. Their collars might be replaced by transport collars, though they could also ship locked in the collars of the Sharks or even of the Martian Exploration and Colony Company. Each woman would have her source node ID and destination node ID and the last four digits of her SIN written on her left breast in three colors of removable ink. A transport order specifying shippers, waypoints and treatment at those way points, would be finalized in the system. Transport tags would be prepared for both each woman with her SIN, her owner's name, her package ID, and her routing information and the tag would be attached to her left ear. After that, the Sharks would take both women to City of Frederick Slave Market and likely the Frederick Market would transport both women to the Baltimore Slave Market themselves. They'd then be held at the Baltimore Market, fed and watered as necessary, and loaded on whatever transport carrier the East Coast Local had approved for the next leg of their journey south. If a shipper failed to appear or canceled a shipment, the East Local would use a shipper of comparable rating and adjust the schedule to move the slaves on thru in good health. A slave might go thru several carriers and would have bio breaks and kibble and water at stops along the way as required by the rules of the East Coast Local. An enema might be scheduled at one her intermediate way points if the trip took long enough. They would deliver both women to the Jacksonville Slave Market, which would arrange the last leg of their journey to the to the receiving docks of the Martian Exploration and Colony Company complex in Cape Canaveral.
A certain distain for the comfort of the slave in transit and a complete distain for their dignity is, of course, not just traditional but considered necessary and desirable. It helps keep slaves in their place. The safety of the slave in transport, on the other hand, has become increasingly important as slavery has become more ubiquitous and both Cheryl and Susan would be heavily insured. There would be hell to pay if either woman arrived injured or didn't arrive at all, but there was pretty much no chance of that.
Was it really necessary and desirable that I be kept in my place? While I was a slave, I understood I was a slave and accepted that I would be treated as a slave, which I expected and felt competent to deal with. Being treated as a slave and kept in my place affirmed my understanding of the world and my place in it and yes, it also often gave me a sexual thrill. Treating me any other way would have felt like gaslighting. I did not,
Beyond the Thirty-Fourth Amendment: The Origins and Doctrine of Modern American Slavery
notwithstanding, believe I deserved nothing better; I believed I deserved to eventually rejoin the human race as a free woman but, while I was a slave, it felt normal for me to be treated as a slave. It made me feel safe, like those big cats at the zoo who supposedly think that their cages protect them from the humans, not the other way round. It was being an engineer and an astronaut and having to explain to my masters, as an engineer and astronaut, why they were wrong that made me feel exposed and at risk. Yet being an engineer and an astronaut wasn't just why I had agreed to my indenture, they were two of the things my owners needed me to be. I would serve my masters, in part, by opposing them, which is an uncomfortable situation for a slave to be in. I tried to think of myself as a trained service animal that will, if they judge an action they are being directed to take dangerous, practice "intelligent disobedience" and refuse that action.
Master Peterson was a thirtyish man but Mistress Springfield was young, about twenty. There had been college age people in the club but those were guests I'd known how to serve. She was slim and athletic and with short blond hair like I had. Now I was going to get bossed by a wrangler who could be my younger sister.
"She's a mistress," I thought. "You're a slave. She gives the orders. You obey the orders. She's a human; you are an animal. Give her attitude and you'll deserve the punishment you will receive, no matter how she treats you. Just hope she doesn't have too big a chip on her shoulder."
Mistress Springfield held herself well and I started to relax a little. She was, it seemed, an experienced wrangler in spite of her young age. She projected confidence and self-control.
Master Crenshaw secured a leash to my collar and used the shocker to release the shackle on my left ankle. He led me thru the side door of the van, which had a row of two kennels stacked two high for a total of four secured at the back of the van. They were rather small, being only about four foot long, three foot wide and three foot high. I was directed into kennel in the bottom row at the left side of the vehicle. I crawled into the kennel, pulled the leash in after me, and heard the gate close and the click of lock being set behind me. The kennel contained a clean slave pad that nevertheless had a slight smell of urine and there was no slave litter. With any luck, we weren't in there for the long haul, but if not to Cape Canaveral, where were we bound?
Master Crenshaw loaded Erin beside me, and Denise on top of Erin and then said "You're all fine slaves but you're still new to the collar. What is your duty?"
"To serve the pleasure and convenient of our master," we all said together.
"Make me proud of you," he said, and left the van.
We understood, without being told, that we were not to speak unless spoken to. After perhaps fifteen minutes, we were joined by two handlers not associated with the Sharks. Master Miller closed the side door of the van and got into the passenger seat. Master Lee got in the driver's seat and, coordinating with two other vehicles that were accompanying us, started our trip. Master Miller and Master Lee occasionally communicated with the other vehicles, but they mostly talked shop, and stories about various slaves and slave handlers. While they never talked to us directly, it became clear that they were taking us to a rented business jet.
